Emulating Mac System 7 on an Android device

Over on the 68kmla forums, a website dedicated to old Macs built before 1994, [zydeco] released his Android port of Mini vMac, a Macintosh Plus emulator that puts the power of a Motorola MC68000 processor and System 7 on any computer.

Unlike the original Macintosh, or the subsequent revision that bumped the RAM up to 512 kilobytes, the Mac Plus was actually useful. With the addition of a SCSI port and support for 4 Megabytes of RAM, it’s not only possible to browse the Internet, but also act as a server. There’s a reason [Sprite_tm] chose to rebuild one of these classic, all-in-one machines to act as a home server; they really do epitomize the elegant computers from a more civilized age.

68kmla user [FlyingToaster] even went so far as to put a Mac Plus in his nook touch. With this, he’s got a full-blown installation of System 7 running on an e-ink screen, complete with Lemmings, Gauntlet, and Tetris.

It should be possible to plug this emulated box into the Internet. Unfortunately, experience tells us it won’t be a very pleasant browsing experience outside Hackaday’s retro edition.

There’s a reason Sprite_tm chose to rebuild one of these classic, all-in-one machines to act as a home server

This is very misleading. He didn’t rebuild the Mac to be used as a home server because it was a competent machine. He gutted the machine and used the case because he liked the case. The computing power was provided by a Dockstar.

I’ve been running Mini vMac on my idevice for years no – was there really never a port for droids??

It’s damn cool, I think, that I managed to image my Mac SE’s harddrive a long time ago before I put it in storage (It’s a whopping 20MB!) and can play all my old games, look at my old macpaints, or even grade school homework.

I cannot quite vouch for it, as I have barely gotten it to work, but the DroidMac project (now dead) seems worthwhile. It boots up fine immediately after an install (using a Quadra650 ROM and a 7.5.5 .img), but it seems to either freeze once it’s done booting, or just refuse to accept input. If you can figure a way around this, or feel like taking up the reins of the project, go right ahead. If you get it working, please do share with the rest of us. :)

It’s based on Basilisk II, so it might actually play games like the above-mentioned (@Juliansr, @Brian Benchoff) Escape Velocity, which requires at least 8MB RAM to function. Considering MinivMac only has 8MB to begin with, EV won’t run.

Getting Escape Velocity to run on a portable device has been a dream of mine since the first port of MinivMac to Nintendo DS. I would love nothing more than to miss my stop on the train because I was playing EV. :D

Wups. stupid me using a Quadra 650 ROM, even though it’s only compatible with a IIci and a Q900. Unfortunately, changing to a Q900 ROM didn’t fix the problem. The mouse input still seems to be ignored.